I cook poorly, I craft obsessively and I love the look of a retro cocktail. When I am feeling guilty about taking time away from my family with my obsessions, I make videos about my guilt as "The Guilty Crafter" or I blog here. Thanks for stopping by!

Entries in DIY cocktail identifiers
(1)

This past Friday, I received a phone call from the producer of a local morning news show here in Portland asking if I would be interested in coming on and doing a craft segment. Um, YES! I love adding weird life experience to my "done-that" list. "Great!" she said, "See you Tuesday!" Wait. Did she just say Tuesday? THIS Tuesday?!

[Scramble, scramble, minor freak-out...]

And then, just like that, I'm in the green room with one of my first Portland-area friends (thanks for coming, Kim!). I was decked out in a retro cocktail dress while gearing myself up to crank up the kooky. And then we met the other 3 guests of the day: The elegant and spiritual Germaine Parra, author of "Searching for the Caravan: A Reconciliation with Love, Science and Divinity," the warm and charming Mantu Joshi whose book " The Resilient Parent: Everday Wisdom for Life with Your Exceptional Child" was written in his limited spare time as he stays home to raise his family's 3 small children. And then there was the high-energy duo of Lisa Cohn and her little boy Michael who have co-authored a children's book about how to deal with the loss of a pet ("Bash and Lucy"). Michael is 5. FIVE. So yeah.

Oh, and me? I made a bottle cap to hang off of some booze. (See the picture below to put that into perspective). Naturally I started humming this tune and dialed myself back at bit on the kooky factor. But still. Good times. I loved the experience and what wonderful people to hang out with on a random Tuesday morning in my new hometown. Afterwards, Kim and I went to breakfast and then did a little shopping at Goodwill with me still wearing my retro cocktail dress and sparkly tights- no one so much as batted an eye. I love this town.

Oh- and you can catch my segment online here (and yes, my hair was crazy. I haven't found a hairstylist here that can take me at a moment's notice. See also: humidity.):

Guests' projects, in clockwise order, starting at the top left: spiritual, caring and helpful, moving and inspirational. And my booze charm. Nice.